Man, when I burn out on MoFo I REALLY burn out on MoFo. I wish I had some good excuse, but I don’t. I can’t even say I ran out of movies ready to go, I have had a post for Showgirls/Conair open on my computer, half written, for four days. But I counted posts and I still got 15 posts up, and the goal is 20, so I only failed a teensy bit.

A few people have said I should keep doing dinner and a movie menus all year long, and while I do want to keep doing this as my MoFo theme for as long as feasible (until i’m so desperate i’m doing Dinner and a National Geographic Documentary), I had a few that I made stuff for so I absolutely want to squeeze those out. And I might throw up a menu on occasion, but for now: I am so sick of watching movies, dudes. I had to re-watch a lot of the movies I posted to get proper menu inspiration, and on top of my regular tv, I just. I kind of want to go outside? Maybe get away from the glowing box? ANYWAY, onto my last post for MoFo this year.

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He hates these trees! Stay away from the trees!

I was lucky enough to catch Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter at our local drive-in this summer. When you live in the Land of Lincoln, you get kind of numb to all of the Lincoln stuff. I drive past Lincoln’s home all the time, i’ve rubbed the nose of the lucky bust at Oak Ridge plenty. So not only did I find this movie fun because of the action and normal, non-sparkly vampires, but because it renewed my interest in Abraham Lincoln and the time he spent here. I found out that his human cohorts in the movie are all real people, although their roles in his life are slightly tweaked to better fit the movie. Learin’!

The movie doesn’t try to alter the course of history, it simply interjects the idea that from early adulthood all the way up to his death, President Lincoln was also a vampire hunter. It all starts when he seeks revenge on the man who poisoned his mother (in actuality, Nancy Lincoln died from milk sickness, go vegan!) and discovers that he isn’t so easy to kill. And he has fangs and is really strong and whoa boy is he kind of a snarky dick about it. But luckily, Abe meets a guy who wants to train him. Yet you never see this dude kill vampires himself…curious. Anyway, all through moving to Springfield, meeting Mary Todd, and getting into politics, Abe is killin’ vampires left and right. There is killing, war, hijinks, fights on burning trains, and as we all know, eventually Mr. Lincoln is going to take a trip to the theater.

This movie was filmed in 3D, which I don’t like because when you’re at the drive-in you’re like, “God damn, these angles are annoying.” But there is lots of crazy good action and stunts, I half expected Milla Jovovich to pop out at the plantation and start shooting some bitches in the head. You wouldn’t think that Abraham Lincoln and the words ‘thrill ride’ go together, but they do! If you like action flicks but hate the dumbed down dialog, you will like this movie. It has received mixed reviews, but pfffft on what anyone but me thinks.

This is an indie flick so there aren’t any huge stars, but a few very familiar faces: Anthony Mackie (2Pac in Notorious, The Hurt Locker), Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Deathproof, Scott Pilgrim), Jimmi Simpson (Always Sunny, Breakout Kings), Marton Csokas (LotR trilogy), and some guy named Alan Tudyk who likes to play with dinosaur figures and talk like a pirate.

If you are going to watch one of the few movies that will ever feature Springfield, you have to eat our one local delicacy: The Horseshoe. I’ve posted about it before, but earlier this year the Illinois Times posted an article about the history of the horseshoe, how it’s changed over the years (now made mostly with gross frozen fries), and the original cheese sauce recipe. I tucked that away in my brain because if you look at the recipe (way down at the bottom), it’s so easy to veganize. So easy that i’m not going to pretend I ‘made’ the recipe by swapping, so here are some step-by-steps:

1. Acquire or make a loaf of white bread, bake if needed. Slice into toastable thickness. Hide the bread from the cat.
2. Slice some potatoes (also if you are doing veggies, those too), dice them, whatever shape you want, if you’re doing wedges I suggest baking over cooking in a pan. I sliced them into rounds that were thick enough so they wouldn’t come out like chips, just crispy on the outside and warm and soft on the inside. I also fried them in a cast iron pan.
3. While the potatoes are cooking, follow the recipe for the original cheese sauce with vegan subs (we used oil, almond milk, PBR, and a wedge of Daiya cheddar). You’ll spend a few minutes just poking the potatoes and stirring the sauce and singing to the dogs.
4. Now is the time to do your ‘meat’. It can be various veggies, a portobello cap, whatever fake meat or soy thing you desire. We used Upton’s seitan because they are Chicago-based (and it’s delicious), so I just waited for my potatoes to be done, moved them to a paper towel, drained the oil, and cooked the Upton’s in the cast iron.
5. Toast your bread.
6. Assemble! Lay 1-2 pieces of bread (ours was pretty small so we did two) down, pile with potatoes and your meaty stand-in, drown in cheesy cheese sauce. Dig in and remember to name your food baby after me.

Obviously this is not a healthy recipe. Lots of places do offer vegetable horseshoes (and you’ll notice that the one pictured in the article is vegetarian), so it’s possible to do it up right and get some veggies in, but you can’t make a fat-free horseshoe. To even try would be depressing. I’m just adding this as a disclaimer. And yes, it is RICH. The portion size of a modern horseshoe is so insane, way bigger than what Brian and I made, and I couldn’t finish mine. Also as a disclaimer, the cheese sauce does not look pretty as it cools down and congeals, so either eat it all ASAP or be prepared to hide your leftovers from the sight of anyone who will go, “EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU EATING GROSS VEGAN”.

Dessert: If you have the room, you probably don’t have the desire to make anything fancy. Lucky for you, Mr. Lincoln wasn’t big on food and preferred simple desserts, like a plate of fruit and nuts. So microwave ‘baked’ apples sound pretty perfect for our Abe dessert.

Megan made Cranberry Walnut Nog Fudge – a great way to use up Silk nog, which you will buy too much of and inevitably get sick of. If you’re like me, anyway. And now you know what to do with the rest of the carton!

Funnily enough, when I posted this challenge I didn’t have a single cranberry of any kind in the house. I didn’t even go out and buy cranberries until I got off of work today. Earlier today I was lamenting that I had half a pumpkin pie left and Brian broke my can of Soyatoo (I kept telling him that the 30 second high wasn’t worth it, but he wouldn’t listen*), so I didn’t want to eat it as is. How do you recycle a pumpkin pie?

Answer: you make pudding.

And how do you incorporate cranberries into that?

Answer: you make a parfait.

I had a busy evening ahead of me, so I was happy that I was able to think of something that came together quickly. I made the cranberry sauce first, just following the instructions on the bag with slightly less sugar so it would be more tart. I took half of a pumpkin pie, cookie crust and all, and tossed it in the food processor with 1/4 a cup of oat milk, blending and adding a few splashes of milk at a time until it was a pudding-like consistency. I didn’t want it to be runny but I wanted to be able to spoon it into the glasses easily.

I had granola already made, I just sifted out the raisins and big chunks. So when the sauce had cooled I just layered everything in the glass and was done! The pumpkin pie pudding was obviously plenty sweet and a nice contrast to the cranberry sauce. Half of a pumpkin pie made enough pudding for a little more than two of these glasses, and I had plenty of cranberry sauce to spare. Shit, now i’m going to have to recycle that too!

*I’m just kidding about Brian huffing the whipped cream air, he doesn’t do drugs! I wasn’t kidding about the 30 second high not being worth it, though. I’d rather get my whipped cream out of the can!

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Once upon a time, Amy told me that she likes to put wing sauce on macaroni and cheese. I thought that was one of the most fabulous ideas i’d ever heard, so I tried it. AND IT WAS. Just a little drizzle of hot and slightly sweet wing sauce goes wonderfully on creamy, but usually kind of plain, macaroni and cheese. I call it Amy Deluxe.

Well, I just took it to the next level. To the Supreme level!

Here’s what you do:

Make wing sauce (you really don’t need too much, I made about half a cup and it was way too much and I paid dearly for that).

Make seitan or steam some tempeh and cut it up into bite sized pieces.

Make your favorite vegan macaroni and cheese recipe.

Mix some bread crumbs with vegan margarine and a few herbs.

Put the wing sauce in the bottom (according to Amy, purists put the sauce on the bottom) of a baking dish, add your seitan or tempeh, and toss to coat.

Spoon the macaroni and cheese on top, sprinkle with the bread crumbs, and bake at 350 degrees until the bread crumbs start to brown.